=The Peloponnesian War.=—­After the foundation of the Athenian empire in the Archipelago the Greeks found themselves divided between two leagues—­the maritime cities were subject to Athens; the cities of the interior remained under the domination of Sparta.  After much preliminary friction war arose between Sparta and her continental allies on the one side and Athens and her maritime subjects on the other.  This was the Peloponnesian War.  It continued twenty-seven years (431-404), and when it ceased, it was revived under other names down to 360.

These wars were complicated affairs.  They were fought simultaneously on land and sea, in Greece, Asia, Thrace, and Sicily, ordinarily at several points at once.  The Spartans had a better army and ravaged Attica; the Athenians had a superior fleet and made descents on the coasts of the Peloponnesus.  Then Athens sent its army to Sicily where it perished to the last man (413); Lysander, a Spartan general, secured a fleet from the Persians and destroyed the Athenian fleet in Asia (405).  The Athenian allies who fought only under compulsion abandoned her.  Lysander took Athens, demolished its walls, and burnt its ships.

=Wars against Sparta.=—­Sparta was for a time mistress on both land and sea.  “In those days,” says Xenophon, “all cities obeyed when a Spartan issued his orders.”  But soon the allies of Sparta, wearied of her domination, formed a league against her.  The Spartans, driven at first from Asia, still maintained their power in Greece for some years by virtue of their alliance with the king of the Persians (387).  But the Thebans, having developed a strong army under the command of Epaminondas, fought them at Leuctra (371) and at Mantinea (362).  The allies of Sparta detached themselves from her, but the Thebans could not secure from the rest of the Greeks the recognition of their supremacy.  From this time no Greek city was sovereign over the others.

=Savage Character of These Wars.=—­These wars between the Greek cities were ferocious.  A few incidents suffice to show their character.  At the opening of the war the allies of Sparta threw into the sea all the merchants from cities hostile to them.  The Athenians in return put to death the ambassadors of Sparta without allowing them to speak a word.  The town of Plataea was taken by capitulation, and the Spartans had promised that no one should be punished without a trial; but the Spartan judges demanded of every prisoner if during the war he had rendered any service to the Peloponnesians; when the prisoner replied in the negative, he was condemned to death.  The women were sold as slaves.  The city of Mitylene having revolted from Athens was retaken by her.  The Athenians in an assembly deliberated and decreed that all the people of Mitylene should be put to death.  It is true that the next day the Athenians revised the decree and sent a second ship to carry a more favorable commission, but still more than one thousand Mityleneans were executed.